GCA and Asian Development Bank to Scale Up Nature-Based Solutions for Climate Change Adaptation in Bangladesh
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otterdam, the Netherlands, 24th November 2022 – The Global Center on Adaptation (GCA) and the Asian Development Bank (ADB) have launched an ambitious project to mainstream and scale up Nature-Based Solutions (NBS) through a $310 million investment to help 22 coastal towns in the low-lying delta region of Bangladesh adapt to climate change.
The selected coastal ‘upazilas’ are home to over 5 million people that are exposed to climate change, including through coastal and riverine flooding, sea level rise, tropical cyclones, storm surges, drought, and extreme heat. The Coastal Towns Climate Resilience Project, financed by ADB and the Government of Bangladesh, will strengthen the climate resilience of these towns by enhancing their ability to anticipate, absorb, accommodate, and recover from the effects of climate shocks and stresses, including specific interventions targeted at the poor and women.
The investment project will finance improvements in priority municipal infrastructure and essential services for strengthening climate and disaster resilience and local economic development in project towns. The project will also enhance the livelihood resilience and adaptive capacity of vulnerable households and strengthen institutional capacity, governance, and climate awareness.
GCA will provide upstream technical support, including high-resolution climate data and analytics on the exposure of the infrastructure system to current and projected climate risks. GCA will work with the Local Government Engineering Department (LGED) to use this data to work with 5 of the towns to address the identified climate risks by integrating NBS into investment master plans. LGED will scale up this support across all 22 coastal towns.
This initiative builds on GCA’s ongoing work with the Government of Bangladesh to develop a Climate-Resilient Infrastructure Stress Test to quantify current and future climate risks to Bangladesh’s infrastructure, identify the critical adaptation needs of infrastructure and prioritize a pipeline of resilient infrastructure investments to the most vulnerable areas and communities.
Notes to Editors
About the Global Center on Adaptation
The Global Center on Adaptation (GCA) is an international organization which works as a solutions broker to accelerate action and support for adaptation solutions, from the international to the local, in partnership with the public and private sector, to ensure we learn from each other and work together for a climate-resilient future. Founded in 2018, GCA is hosted by the Netherlands, working from its headquarters in Rotterdam with a knowledge and research hub based in Groningen. GCA has a worldwide network of regional offices in Abidjan, Ivory Coast; Dhaka, Bangladesh and Beijing, China. Through this evolving network of offices and global and regional GCA teams, the organization engages in high-level policy activities, new research contributions, communications, and technical assistance to governments and the private sector.
